Australia Narrows the Future Submarine Bidders to Japan, Germany and France.

On Friday 20, 2015 the Australian Governments decided to select:

- the Government of Japan (effectively including Japanese Ministry of Defence (JMD), MHI and KHI)

- TKMS from Germany, and

- DCNS from France

Sweden was effectively excluded by not being mentioned. The Government stressed that weight was given to the bidders actually building submarines now.

The best succinct mainstream media article, on February 20, 2015, was probably http://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-02-20/japan-france-germany-to-compete-for-submarine-build/6159834

The longest article is http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/at-least-500-jobs-to-come-from-submarine-project-but-no-guarantee-of-local-construction-20150220-13k5c0.html with more on South Australia’s expected negative reaction

For the leadup to the Friday 20, 2015 decision see http://gentleseas.blogspot.com.au/2015/02/open-tender-versus-competitive.html particularly about the main Australian workforce involvement being the integration of the US-Australian evolved AN/BYG-1 combat system.

As things stand I would say the Australian Government's favourites are Japan, Germany and France - in that order.

Pete